Humanise The Numbers - for ambitious accountants in practice – Détails, épisodes et analyse

When you listen in to a conversation with a leader of an accounting business with over 100 people, and you hear how seriously they take investment in their team now so that it delivers a return in 12, 18, 24 or even 36 months, it's well worth considering what’s being said. 

So, when Rebecca Mihalic of the Australian firm businessDEPOT talks about taking team members along to client meetings, not as a piece of furniture (to use her language), but as active participants in the meeting, using the tools of the meeting to enable them to contribute in a valuable, meaningful way, you can see how Rebecca is growing her team to deliver a result for her personally. She can cascade client relationship work to others, work that otherwise might not happen. 

It's a valuable discussion. There's a phrase towards the end of the discussion where Rebecca talks about creating a safe space to fail and a safe space to win as being one of the fundamental concepts that she uses when leading and managing her team. 

You’ll find many helpful insights in this discussion with Rebecca. I hope you'll go to your favourite podcast platform, whether it be iTunes or Spotify or another platform, or join us at humanisethenumbers.online and look for this podcast discussion with Rebecca Milahic. 

Please scroll down the episode page for this podcast for the contact information for Rebecca and for the additional, downloadable resources mentioned in the podcast.

It's simply brilliant when you can spend some time with a chartered accountant, one who spent 17 years with EY down in Australia before becoming an owner-managed business buying accountancy services. 

Craig believes that an accountant does a brilliant job, a better job, if they're 80% human and 20% accountant when working with their owner-managed business clients. 

This podcast discussion is with Craig McKell, from our very good friend AdvanceTrack. Craig is working in the profession again and is now the General Manager of Asia Pacific for AdvanceTrack. 

He's amazed at the challenges the profession faces from a talent-shortage perspective. He shares a brilliant insight around the fact that you don't have to fall far from the corporate world of accountancy to make a real difference with real people – owner-managed businesses. 

It's worth going to this podcast to understand what you do, for example, with three names. What could you do with three names so that you're more human than you are an accountant (80% human, 20% accountant)? 

You’ll find great value in this podcast as we discuss the 80/20 rule according to Craig McKell. 

I hope you enjoy this practical, passionate podcast with Craig McKell of AdvanceTrack. 

All you need to do is go to your favourite podcast platform or join us at humanisethenumbers.online and seek out the podcast with Craig McKell.

Please scroll down the podcast’s episode page for the contact information for Craig and for the additional, downloadable resources mentioned in this podcast.

The key question – how do you and your firm make a difference? – makes a difference in the conversations you have with your current team members when it comes to connecting them up with the real meaning behind what you're doing. 

Making a difference and communicating that will also help you connect with potential future employees so that they're more likely to join your firm rather than another, ultimately making a difference to the business owner clients that you currently work with, as well as to future prospective clients. 

If these future prospective clients are able to see that you can really make a difference to them and their business, they’re more likely, obviously, to want to work with you and your firm. 

In this podcast with Mark Walker of VFD Pro, Mark unpacks his experience as a senior financial professional, including his time as a board-level finance officer at Carnival Cruises and his work with The Co-Op, as well as with a number of SMEs.  He has built a product, a tool, that's shown him, his client accountancy firms and their clients how they can make a difference by better connecting. Yes, there is a conversation around the future of their business, and yes, around the finances, but also around the whole business, so that there's a stronger relationship. 

That's why I think this podcast discussion is so important. I hope you'll take time out to go to humanisethenumbers.online or to your favourite podcast platform to find this podcast with Mark Walker. I’m sure you’ll find it really valuable. 

Please scroll down this episode page for the contact information for Mark and for the additional, downloadable resources mentioned in this podcast.

Where's the value in your firm around pulling together absolute clarity around the behavioral standards, values, and beliefs, that you want to live by in your accountancy firm?

Is the hard thinking, hard work going to pay off for you and your firm?

Well, on this Humanise The Numbers podcast discussion with Phool and Cheryl, owners and leaders of two different accounting firms, they share their insights on how getting clarity on values has actually paid off for them.

Whether it be in recruiting new team members, setting standards of performance with their existing team or even the impact of sharing values with clients.

I've just finished a workshop with eight different accounting firms, the smallest with a team of 12, and the largest with a team of more than 200 people. 

We openly discussed the merits of having no values, having good values that aren't really lived, and having great values that genuinely exist in their firm, values that are lived, that you can see happening every week, every day, across the firm. 

Now clearly, if a team of people seriously buy into a set of values, seriously buy into the purpose you have for your firm, they're going to have a reference point for all the decisions and all their actions, which will sponsor the future success of your firm.

So why not join me, Phool and Cheryl on this Humanise The Numbers podcast discussion and see what they have to say about interaction with team members, interactions with potential future team members, interactions with clients and how values impact those really key conversations that ultimately fuel the future success of their firm and can fuel the future success of your firm too.

When on this episode page, please scroll down for the contact information for Phool and Cheryl and to find additional resources mentioned in the podcast.  

This is podcast 3 of 5 of the ACCA Strategy Series

Where's the value in having a crystal clear sense of purpose for your accountancy firm?

On this Humanise The Numbers podcast discussion, you're going to hear from James Lizars and Steph Rickaby, two sole owners of two modest size accounting firms that think big  about their core purpose.

And you'll hear Paul Shrimpling ask them, where's the payoff?  Where's the value in having and building and creating and living a real sense of purpose?

 Hope you enjoy the discussion with James and Steph.  When on this episode page, please scroll down for the contact information for James and Steph and to find additional resources mentioned in the podcast.  

Is it worth the time, the effort, the energy in talking strategy in an accounting firm?

Well, this was a question posed to me by ACCA.

So, on this Humanise The Numbers podcast you'll hear Douglas Aitken, a colleague of mine, and I talk about the core elements of strategy and how those core elements can deliver a true return on investment for you and your firm.

This is podcast 1 of 5 in the ACCA Strategy Series.
 When on this episode page, please scroll down for the contact information for Douglas and to find additional resources mentioned in the podcast.  

How do you define in your firm the concept of real time accounting? And is it really meaningful?

In this Humanise The Numbers discussion with Stefan Barrett of Bee Motion an accountancy firm in Stockport, you'll hear Stefan share his insights around what real-time accounting means to him and how he makes it valuable to his clients.

When on this episode page, please scroll down for the contact information forStefan and to find additional resources mentioned in the podcast.  

Where's the value in an accountant, having a strategy conversation with a client and then accountability conversations with clients?

Well, in this Humanise The Numbers podcast discussion with Hugh Steadman of C&H Steadman in Hemel Hempstead, you'll hear Hugh describe his views on how talking the historical reports from annual accounts is so last year and actually talking about the future is so where we need to be at as a profession.

Hugh also shares his stories of helping clients with outsourcing, strategy, recruitment and how a serious illness last year created a huge opportunity for his firm and allowed his team to step up in a way that has had a profound impact on the future of the firm.
 When on this episode page, please scroll down for the contact information for Hugh and to find additional resources mentioned in the podcast.  

What must it be like for the leadership team of an accountancy firm to be not a hundred percent confident, but seriously confident about the future stability of their firm.

You're about to hear from Suda Ratnam of 70 person, 11 partner firm Raffingers on the outskirts of London, share what they as a firm are doing to humanise the numbers in their firm based on their mentoring program for their team.

And also a quarterly review process with their team to ensure that everyone in the firm is on the track to progress, to be doing the best work they can do and to feel as though they're very much part of the progression of the firm.

So please, why not join me and Suda Ratnum at HumaniseTheNumbers.online for this podcast discussion that ultimately sees Raffingers invest in their people quite significantly, and fits very well with the message around 'If  you don't grow your people, you won't grow your practice'. But if you do grow your people, you will grow your practice fees, profits, capital value and cash. And also that sense of pride and enjoyment of running a humanised accountancy business.

When on this episode page, please scroll down for the contact information for Suda and to find additional resources mentioned in the podcast.  

What do you think it would be like to grow an accountancy firm from 30 people strong to 200 people strong 4 offices, 18 partners, and still retain the feel and culture of the family firm you were 30 years ago when there was 30 people in the firm.

Nathan Keeley from Carpenter Box down in Sussex, joins me on this HumaniseTheNumbers.Online podcast and shares in quite intimate detail, a number of the things they've done and things they're doing to ensure that they've got that sense of collaboration within the team and the sense of collaboration too, with their clients.

Yes, they’ve been using technology but also looking at every role in every department in its own merits and building KPIs that suit each individual and each department in its own merits. I think you'll find a huge amount of value in what Nathan has shared in this podcast. And I hope you'll join me at HumaniseTheNumbers.online

And please, if you get the opportunity to give me your feedback, it'd be great to hear from you.  When on this episode page, please scroll down for the contact information for Nathan and to find additional resources mentioned in the podcast.